This article looks at the iPad's role as a musical instrument through the lens of a live performance ensemble that performs primarily on iPads. It also offers an overview of a pedagogical model used by this ensemble, which emphasizes musician autonomy in small groups, where music is learned primarily through aural means and concerts are…

The jazz ensemble represents an important performance opportunity in many school music programs. Due to the cultural history of jazz as an improvisatory art form, school jazz ensemble directors must address methods of teaching improvisation concepts to young students. Progress has been made in the field of prescribed improvisation activities and…

This article offers instrumental directors at all levels some suggestions for the use of movement to facilitate "beat competency". We use the term beat competency to refer to a musician's ability to play with a consistent sense of pulse and balanced subdivision, as well as the eventual ability to bring that sense of pulse to reading…

This article begins with a brief history of children's singing instruction in schools. When Kenneth Phillips began researching children's singing, he was surprised to learn that a strong program of child vocal pedagogy was in place in America's schools for about a hundred years--the 1830s to the 1930s. By the 1950s however, all that…

In 1989, Bennett Reimer wrote that there are three ways through which people can experience music: performing, listening, and composing. Similarly, in the current National Standards document, MENC [now the National Association for Music Education (NAfME)] identifies performing, creating, and responding to music as the "fundamental music…

The discoveries of score analysis (e.g., minor seventh chord, ostinato, phrase elision, melodic fragment, half cadence) are more than just compositional techniques or music vocabulary. They are sounds--fascinating, storytelling, dynamic modes of expression--that when approached as such enrich the rehearsal experience. This article presents a…

A number of scholars have investigated the roots of the "Arirang," although the origins are debated. Most agree that the original form of the song "Arirang" was first found upstream from Seoul along the Han River. The lyrics told the story of a woman waiting for her lover on the bank of the river. The term "Arirang"…

A portfolio can document student skills, abilities, growth, achievement, and attitudes. It can also reflect students' learning processes and subsequently guide new teaching strategies. Portfolio proponents have used these arguments to justify the time and organization needed to successfully implement them in their classrooms and in their school…

Learning improvisation in music is often treated as the process of gaining skills to spontaneously perform within the conventions of a style. Alternatively, learning improvisation can offer musicians a place to explore sound as it happens in free improvisation. Within the school setting, the former approach is commonly used in the jazz programs,…

The Partnership for 21st Century Skills lists among its top priorities for students the development of "learning and innovation skills," of which the first are "creativity and innovation." The third National Standard from the National Association for Music Education is "Improvising melodies, variations, and accompaniments." These guiding…

Pressure on music educators to accommodate reading initiatives in their schools continues to challenge genuine music-learning experiences. Children are taken out of music classrooms for additional reading time, although mounting research informs us of the value of music as a formidable avenue for developing crucial auditory skills needed for…

The elementary music class is an ideal setting for building socioemotional skills in children. These skills can assist children in their early music learning through brain development, and they become increasingly important as students reach higher levels of musicianship. Socioemotional learning programs are currently being used to reduce at-risk…

Teaching students to practice independently is an important part of a music teacher's work. Yet, many common techniques used to teach and enforce student practicing, such as practice charts and performance tests, can backfire, causing students to practice inefficiently or lose their love of music. In search of a method of teaching practicing that…

Skillful teachers have developed the ability to take learners from the first conception of a goal to its accomplishment in shorter and shorter periods of time, with fewer and fewer errors on the learners' part and with increasing satisfaction and diminishing frustration on the teacher's. This article deals with the extent to which teachers provide…

Ambitious ideals are seldom achieved completely. Realistically, the criterion of success is not so much full accomplishment as satisfactory progress. The author urges music educators to pause now and then to consider their status in this regard. Are they moving ahead to fulfillment of their hopes in ways adequate to their compelling vision? Events…